Specialties

Proper planning (or lack thereof) is the single biggest factor in the success on a web project. Without proper planning, prior to design and build, clients will often find themselves disappointed with the end deliverable. We like to establish a clear scope of work, if not a vision, which outlines client expectations for the end product. This ensures that we build to that scope of work and those expectations, and leaves no concerns at the end of the project. We accomplish through business requirements gathering sessions, discovery sessions, technical audits, stakeholder interviews, and other necessary activities required for information gathering. We ask a lot of questions to help guide you through this process. From this a project charter is developed which acts as the blueprint for development, although it may change as decisions are made throughout the project. The comprehensive project charter is how we measure success on our deliverables.

Often clients require Fenix to assess their current web technologies and platforms to find deficiencies, opportunities, and recommendations for improvement. Often an audit is required before we start working on a project, particularly if we are taking on someone else's applications or work. Understanding these issues is important for business planning and decision making moving forward, and for setting expectations.

At Fenix we develop a wireframe prototype for each unique page and feature of the site. This allows the client to "see" the presentation and layout of each unique page prior to design and build. Seeing the plan visualized is immensely helpful for clients. It allows our clients to make necessary changes and revisions based on what they see. These wireframes are used as the basis for the design and build.

Understanding how to design that is both aesthetically pleasing, meets client expectations, and addresses functional requirements is our focus. We understand designing for the web and implement best practices alongside innovative treatments for a beautifully executed end result. We are additionally mindful of any compliance, branding, or other requirements associated with your organization's mandate. Our designs are built responsive and we use a grid system to ensure viability at build. Additionally, we keep languages top of mind during our design to ensure it will work work with longer titles and label names.

Programming and build is where our projects spend most of their time. Given our commitment to proper planning and approvals at every phase of the project, the build phase should go nice and smooth. Given the sheer scale and complexity of the sites we develop, projects typically stay in the build phase for the longest duration of the project. Our developers are brilliant. They build to best practices and accepted conventions, while also having a unique ability to troubleshoot and resolve issues that arise unexpectedly around functionality. Attention to detail and quality of work ensure that each build phase, or sprint, is completed and sent to QA while another sprint begins. Our developers work to the approved deliverables from the phases preceding build. As many as four to six developers may work on one project at a time to meet delivery time frames. For those projects that require multiple developers to work concurrently, we use GIT and Github applications to manage code and versioning.

Fenix has earned a reputation for the high quality of our deliverables. And we take this reputation seriously. All projects are thoroughly tested prior to client beta review. Fenix uses a context-sensitive approach that tests all aspects of your site: from individual components to the site as a complete system. Our exploratory model lets us catch the bugs others might miss. Skills we use include: context-driven testing, client acceptance testing, integration testing, exploratory testing, black box testing, and smoke testing.

We are so lucky to have great client relationships, those that last long after the completion of the project. At Fenix, we never leave you stranded; in fact, we like to think of ourselves as your web partner. We offer a number of Support options, two of which tend to be most often requested. These include:

Drupal Update Support > we offer quarterly updates of all Drupal patches and releases to our Drupal based clients, and critical security releases resolved immediately. This alleviates the need for our clients to keep their Drupal software up-to-date and ensures the software is clean and secure.

Maintenance/SLA > Many of our clients want to put on retainer to do updates, enhancements and changes to the site. We do this either by quoting each requirement, tracking our time and charging based on per diems, or through a maintenance contract where the client has paid for a period of time per month and we use up that time as each request arises. We are happy to work in either capacity and can help you with your ongoing needs .

Most of our clients require a hosting solution and we are happy to provide this through our partner Box Fabric, a state-of-the-art, secure, and climate-controlled facility with servers located in Ottawa, Canada. Box Fabric offers both shared and virtual private servers to meet all our client needs. Additionally, for Drupal clients, we have Acquia and Pantheon partnerships, bwhich both offer hosting & services for Drupal websites.